As a priest from the Diocese of
Dindigul, South India, I am very much pained to read about the persecutions of
Christians in Orissa (“Like Being Tortured for Christ,” Sept. 14 and “India’s
Newest Martyrs,” Sept. 28). I, along with the priests and religious of India
working in America and the Christian communities living here, express our
sympathy and solidarity and extend our prayers.

Pope John Paul II once said that the
Word of God would spread in India through persecutions like in the early
Church. We are privileged to have this blessing of spreading God’s Kingdom in
our soil, though humanly speaking, it involves much struggle and experience of
pain on our part. We pray that God may fill us, the disciples of Jesus in
India, with a spirit of evangelization and perseverance to bear witness to the
good news of Jesus.

Father
M. Peter Amaladoss

St.
Patrick Catholic Church

McCook,
Nebraska

Catholic Hero? Not to Me

I was incredulous but intrigued as
my friend began reading snippets of “Even Superheroes Need Superheroes” (Sept.
14) to me a few weeks ago. I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard, “With all
deference to The Robe and The
Passion of the Christ, Hollywood hasn’t made movies as authentically
Catholic as the Hellboy series since The
Bells of St. Mary’s.” I only had the movie title and some dim
memories of the advertising to go on, so I reserved judgment until I was able
to rent Hellboy. I got my chance, and now I know
my suspicions were well-founded.

This
is the most misleading article I have ever read in the Register. There is
nothing in the movie Hellboy that conveys what Mr. Stagnaro calls
“authentically Catholic.” When asked if he is Catholic, Hellboy’s adoptive
“father” replies, “among other things.” Yes, he carries a rosary around his
wrist, but he is never seen praying. Mr. Stagnaro gives me the impression that
he thinks hanging a rosary from my rearview mirror constitutes sufficient
devotion. I disagree wholeheartedly. In my view, this type of representation of
the Catholic faith only gives fuel to the argument that it’s a quaint but
irrelevant cultural remnant of a bygone era.

Finally, I am not an expert, but I
would think that authentically Catholic art would portray hideous red-skinned
monsters with horns and tails as evil rather than as heroes. The Catholic
references in this movie smack of the worst stereotypes about the one, true
faith. Namely, superstition and ritual are its only offerings. I am disappointed
to find that the Register would tacitly endorse Hellboy
by publishing Mr. Stagnaro’s article outside of the opinion section of the
paper.

Matt
McMenaman

Wall,
New Jersey

In Defense of Adoption

I had to read Melinda Selmys’ piece
“It Is in Love That We Are Made” (Sept. 7) several times before I could believe
my eyes. I’m sure she didn’t mean to, but her comments on adoption were so
hurtful that I couldn’t let them pass.

First,
she tells us of her own prejudices on meeting a “deeply disturbed” man who had
been adopted as an infant, and how she “pictured his adoptive mother as a kind
of monster, incapable of loving this child who had not come from her own womb
...” Thanks be to God, the writer learns she is wrong about the adoptive
mother, but then she goes on to say, “It is a pattern that I have seen repeated
throughout my encounters with adopted children.” What pattern is that?
Disturbed children with adoptive parents who are trying hard, but without
success, to reach them?

Ms. Selmys doesn’t say what her
“encounters” have been that she bases this generalization on. She’s busy moving
on to tell readers that “This is why parents — biological parents, both mother
and father — are the best people to raise their own children.” Again, based on
what experience? How can she be so unaware that when adoption occurs it is
almost always due to crisis circumstances on the part of the biological couple,
usually a single woman without support? Our four children, adopted both
domestically and overseas, would have been raised by individuals who were drug
addicts, involved in prostitution, and in the very best of circumstances, unwed
and unemployed. Is this the “best” the writer refers to?

Now, I know she didn’t mean what she
wrote. Ms. Selmys meant to say that in the best of all circumstances a baby is
conceived in marital love and raised in that same love, as God intended. But
that’s not what she wrote. She goes on to say, “There is a foundation of
similarity; the heart of my daughter is closer to my own than the heart of
someone else’s child.” Well, of course!

What she fails to understand is that
we adoptive parents don’t see our children as “someone else’s.” They are
our own, given to us by God in a miracle that differs from pregnancy and
childbirth, but it is a miracle all the same.

Not every baby, unfortunately, is
conceived in love. But every single one deserves to be raised in love.

Doreen
M. Truesdell

Castleton-on-Hudson,
New York

The author makes some unfortunate
statements about adoption. It is true that God intended biological
families to parent their offspring. However, Selmys overlooks some important
points that our own faith as Catholics can bring to light. Her
statements do not sound even remotely like this beautiful statement from
John Paul II, in his address to adoptive families: “Adopting children,
regarding and treating them as one’s own children, means recognizing that the
relationship between parents and children is not measured only by genetic
standards. Procreative love is first and foremost a gift of self. There is a
form of ‘procreation’ which occurs through acceptance, concern and devotion.
The resulting relationship is so intimate and enduring that it is in no way
inferior to one based on a biological connection. When this is also juridically
protected, as it is in adoption, in a family united by the stable bond of
marriage, it assures the child that peaceful atmosphere and that paternal and
maternal love which he needs for his full human development.”

While God never intended children to
be separated from their original families, it does happen that some birth
parents are not able to parent their children for various reasons. We
adoptive families love all of our children, adopted or otherwise, with a deep,
abiding love. Having parented both a child I gave birth to and a child I
adopted, I can say that, yes, there are differences — but the love is as
intense and the bond as unbreakable with my adopted child as it is with my
biological child.

I do not deny that our child through
adoption may someday develop intense feelings toward her birth
parents. We can open our hearts wide enough to love all that her adoption
brings, and she has enough room in her heart to include two families.

If we follow Jesus’ example, Our
Lord who gave us “a spirit of adoption, through which we cry ‘Abba, Father!’”
(Romans 8:15), all things are possible.

Michele
Allen

Oak
Hill, Virginia

As a mom to seven incredible
blessings — three of whom were not designed by my gene pool, but all by the
hand of God — I wonder how extensive the author’s experiences are when she
speaks of this “pattern that I have seen repeated throughout my encounters with
adopted children.”

I wonder if she has ever met an
adoptive child who is well-adjusted. I can’t imagine that all of the people at
the homeless shelter were adopted. Perhaps it is just possible that there
were people there who didn’t have parents. Or maybe, just maybe, they were
raised by their biological parents and are still struggling to make their way.

I wonder if she has ever seen the
other options that an adopted child would have faced had adoption not been part
of his or her life.
But most of all, I wonder: Has she ever looked into the eyes of a child who so
little resembles her and been showered by God’s grace by what she sees?

I know I have.

Jane
Marcoux
Oswego, Illinois

As a mother to three biological
children and six gifts from God through adoption, I wonder how many adult
adoptees the author has met. Are they all from the homeless shelter? Or
has she sought out other adult adoptees from other sources?

Has she ever contemplated what would
befall these children if they weren’t adopted, if they were left at the hands
of their biological parents (such as the recent case of the 17-month-old who
was tortured and beaten to death by her birth mom and two men)?

Does the author understand that many
children who are placed for adoption via the foster-care system are there
because of neglect, abuse and/or abandonment? What should happen to these
children then?

Has Ms. Selmys ever witnessed the
bond between an adoptive parent and child? Ever heard a child cry out to
his or her adoptive mother, “I wish I could have been born from your tummy and
not your heart”?

Michelle
Myers

Shiremanstown,
Pennsylvania

Response from Melinda Selmys:
I have had several letters from people who were angered by my column.

Specifically, they were upset by my
discussion of adoption, and by the claim that there is often lack of similarity
between an adopted child and his or her adopted parents that can lead to rifts,
lack of understanding, and an inability for a parent to reach their adoptive
child.

My intention was not, in any way, to
disparage the love of adoptive parents for their children, nor to imply that
there are not circumstances where adoption really is the best option for a
child. Certainly, there are many situations where a mother is physically or
emotionally incapable of caring for her newborn; there are also situations
where a child is left without any biological parents whatsoever.

The unique sacrifices that adoptive
parents are called upon to make in order to care for these children are without
a doubt a reflection of the love of Christ.

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